A wince at the stairs. Achy joints after a round of golf or a game of tennis.  The “rusty hinge” feeling in your fingers when you first wake up…

Most of us have been told some version of, “well, that’s just about getting older.” And ageing is real, yes. But so is the desire to keep doing the things we love, without paying for it for days afterwards.

One new joint supplement brand, NIMBL, is trying to tackle that gap using a rather unexpected ingredient from the deep, cold waters off Norway. Short-chain chitosan is derived from shrimp shells caught in the icy waters around Tromsø, Norway – and the results are striking.

“I’m back doing things I thought were behind me”

Before we get into the science, it’s worth listening to the people already taking it. Customer Mike suffered years of stiffness and discomfort before finding relief. He now describes himself as “back doing things I thought were behind me” and walking without the pain that had quietly shrunk his world.

Another reviewer, a primary school teacher on her feet all day, says her aches, stiff joints and inflammation eased within weeks, and that NIMBL has become part of her daily routine – not something she plans to give up.

A daughter writes about her dad, still out surfing and windsurfing in later life, and credits NIMBL with helping him keep moving the way he prefers – on the water, not on the sofa.

You’ll find many more customers talking about reduced pain in fingers, knees and feet within a couple of weeks, getting back to the parts of life they love.

It’s not a miracle cure; results vary and consistency matters. But the common thread is striking: less stiffness, more ease, and a quiet sense of getting bits of life back.

What’s really going on in those creaky joints?

When it comes to joints, it isn’t just “wear and tear”. As we get older, many of us live with a background level of chronic, low-grade inflammation sometimes called “inflammaging”. It’s not the dramatic swelling you might get from an injury, but a gentler, ongoing simmer that can affect cartilage, joint fluid and the tissues around them.

In real life, it feels like:

• Stiff knees when you get out of bed
• Tight hips when you stand up after sitting
• Hands that don’t fancy opening jars or gardening for long
• Paying for exercise with two days of “ouch” instead of a nice glow

From prawn shells in Norway to a capsule on your kitchen counter

At the centre of NIMBL is something called short-chain chitosan. If that sounds like a sci-fi villain, don’t panic – here’s the plain-English version.

Chitosan is a natural substance found in the shells of crustaceans, like prawns and crabs. NIMBL uses prawn shells pulled from the wild, icy waters around Tromsø – shells that would otherwise be waste.

Those shells are carefully cleaned and processed in a way that breaks the chitosan down into smaller, “short-chain” pieces.

Why bother making it smaller? In simple terms, size matters for absorption. Short-chain chitosan is “highly bioavailable”: small enough for your body to absorb and use more quickly, so it can get where it’s meant to go – your joints.

Instead of throwing a long list of ingredients into one capsule and hoping something sticks, the  formula is built around this single, well-studied compound, plus a handful of supporting ingredients, and leaves out the usual “fluff” and fillers.

Thinking about joint supplements?

Whether you’re curious about NIMBL specifically or joint supplements in general, a few common-sense steps apply:

• Talk to your GP or pharmacist, especially if you’re on other medication or have existing health conditions.
• Check the ingredient list. Do you understand what’s in there and why?
• Be realistic about timelines. Your joints won’t transform in a week; think in terms of weeks to months, not days.

And finally, remember that supplements are just one tool. The basics still matter: regular movement you actually enjoy, decent sleep, good food, less stress where you can manage it, and a social life that doesn’t revolve entirely around your sofa.

Getting older is inevitable. Feeling like your world is shrinking doesn’t have to be.

NIMBL on Facebook
NIMBL on Instagram

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Nootropics are – according to Wikipedia – “drugs, supplements and other substances that are claimed to improve cognitive function, particularly executive functions, memory, creativity or motivation in healthy individuals.” The word ‘claimed’ is doing a lot of heavy lifting in that sentence. So do nootropics actually work?

…the target market is old timers who are hoping to regain a fraction of the wakefulness and mental grip we took for granted not so long ago.

Lately, a number of beautifully packaged and branded sub-pharmacological propositions are being marketed at silver panthers, or whatever the marketing goons are calling the 50+ demographic this week. Basically, the target market is old timers who are hoping to regain a fraction of the wakefulness and mental grip we took for granted not so long ago.

I wanted to find out if these non-prescription novelties worked. I am 56, and general wear and tear is setting in.

Memory is a thing I remember fondly

This getting-old lark doesn’t sound so bad if you can laugh at yourself, I had thought, expecting it to start happening when I was 70. But no, it kicked in at 54. Suddenly, I was unable to ascend the stairs without blood draining from the brain to such a degree that I forgot the word ‘scissors’ long enough to remember that that’s why I went upstairs in the first place.

Two flights of stairs to the attic room and I was wiped clean. I could barely remember what year it was let alone the purpose of the mission. I had to stick a list of things I might go upstairs for to the landing wall. But I couldn’t read it because I lost my glasses. So I’d look for clues and spot a cup of tea I made half an hour earlier from a previous futile expedition upstairs.

This getting-old lark doesn’t sound so bad if you can laugh at yourself, I had thought, expecting it to start happening when I was 70. But no, it kicked in at 54.

The tea would be cold, most likely with an insect floating on the surface, but still look drinkable. So I’d take the tea downstairs, scoop out the fatality, and pop it in the microwave so my spirits would be revived and I could start again. Because – obviously – I’d rather take a layer of skin off my lower lip than admit defeat and waste 4p on a new teabag.

Halfway down the stairs, I’d congratulate myself for my economic insight. Perhaps I could share the tip with Martin Lewis at MoneySavingExpert.com. ‘Save money on hot drinks by sweeping the house for half-finished mugs of forgotten tea whenever you go upstairs’.

A never-ending cycle

Lost in this reverie, I failed to notice the cat asleep on the ninth step. Five years ago, my wife bought the cat in a conspiracy with the kids. I assume they chose it deliberately to blend in with the stair carpet. If not, it really is the most extraordinary coincidence. I wouldn’t be surprised if she took a swatch to the breeders to get a good match.

“That’s the colour and the pile I want! If he is going to trip and fall to his death, it needs to look plausible,” she would have said, while cheerfully packing the feline into the car.

I have not yet fallen to my death, but I have had a few close calls. It is at best very unsettling when a step gets up and bolts from beneath your feet, leaving you grasping the banister, heart thumping, system surging with cortisol and adrenaline. This is when I need a biscuit with my tea. I look for the biscuits in the kitchen – and there they are in a sealed packet. That’s why I was looking for the scissors! That cycle can go on for hours. Up and down the stairs, in and out of rooms, back to the kitchen, open the microwave, find another forgotten cup of tea…

Searching for a remedy

It is enough to drive you insane – and into the arms of snake oil salesmen, offering you a return to your scissor-sharp mind. So courtesy of Silver Magazine, I received taster packs of such products. Dr. Vegan offers Vegan Minds pills for memory and focus and Stay Calm pills to manage stress and anxiety. These were to be taken with food, which in my case often means burgers, bacon, or fish, but Dr. Vegan did not specifically counsel against meat-eating, except as a general moral principle.

Noggin meanwhile offers uppers and downers called Oomph and Pause (rather than Oomph and ‘00 mph’, which would have pleased me, but probably lost sales). These had a slightly more impressive list of ingredients than the vegan option – lion’s mane mushroom, rhodiola rosea extract and magnesium, alongside the usual alphabetical suspects. Vegan Minds contains no Magnesium (OMG!) but did have something called ‘BacoMind’ which I hoped might be a concession to carnivores.

So, did they work?

Hard to say. Perhaps I should have set myself specific tasks to determine the enhancement of my cognitive capacities but my daily pandemic schedule – walking the dog, tinkering with copy and providing subordinate services to my wife who is the main breadwinner and Head of Household – is perhaps not the best test of a world class intellect.

But I didn’t feel myself undergoing the kind of transformation one sees depicted in movies by flickering digital code and bullets floating harmlessly past your head. To be fair, neither of them did any harm either. And seeing one’s urine turn the colour of lemon curd, as one’s kidneys frantically try to eject the excess minerals does at least remind you of your good intentions.

I was a poor judge of the third product. Centra Peak, another vitamin-and-mineral concoction, arrived in stylish, masculine navy and bronze packaging. It too has a strong ingredient game, with several unique elements with harvested-from-the-secrets-of-the-rainforest-sounding names. Mucuna pruriens alone is worth the price of admission.

But I cannot pronounce a verdict on Centra Peak because its USP is that it is a male vitality booster that will “enhance your testosterone production”. If it can do so, more power to its elbow. But I found that my testosterone was catastrophically low some years ago and have been on a proper testosterone replacement therapy programme ever since. My testosterone levels were those traditionally associated with an 80-year-old man.

Better the devil you know

As far as over the counter remedies go, however, do any of them give you the kick that a double shot of artisan Arabica – or even a heavy spoonful of instant – can? No, I am afraid not.

When it comes to delivering a cognitive boost, three simple, legal things have worked for me. One is caffeine, obviously, and I dose up on that regularly. I’m sorry to say the second one is nicotine. I don’t use it anymore. But nicotine is a proven, effective cognitive enhancer.

But the third and most surprising boost was changing my diet. Wheat-based foods – bread, pasta, biscuits, and pies – and all sugars are gone. I eat toast in the evening much as one might take sleeping pills.

We are all different and trial-and-error is the only way to find out what works for you. But anything that pretends to deliver the punch of a controlled substance, presented in a jar that looks tasteful on your spice rack, is probably worth taking with a significant pinch of flavour-enhancing sea minerals.

You can follow Simon on Twitter at: @TheSimonEvans

Wondering about vitamin supplements? Find out more here. 

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The post Simon Evans: do nootropics work? appeared first on Silver Magazine.

In recent years, scientists developed a new way of measuring vitamin D levels in the blood, and there has been a stream of studies and trials since. What has been clear is that;

a) more people are low in vitamin D than anyone realised; and…

b) vitamin D deficiency seems to be related to pretty much every disease and condition you can think of.

It’s easy to understand why vitamin D levels might be perilously low in the colder months. You make vitamin D with the help of certain UVB rays from the sun, which then covert a cholesterol-based substance in your skin to vitamin D. This you then absorb into your bloodstream and convert it to other forms in your body. But it’s not just as straightforward as getting a bit of sun.

You can get it from the sun, but it has to be the right sun

To get the right sunrays, the sun needs to be at least 50 degrees above the horizon. Lower than that and they just bounce off the ozone layer back into space. In autumn, winter and early spring, the sun is never high enough in the UK (and similar distances away from the equinox elsewhere in the world). So even on a crisp, sunny winter’s day, you won’t be making any vitamin D on your daily walk or run.

The rest of the year, varying amounts of time in the morning and afternoon are also lacking in vitamin D potential. So again, that pre-work or post-work stroll, run or sea swim won’t do it. The way to tell if the sun is high enough in the sky is to look at your shadow: if it’s shorter than you, then yes, but if it’s longer than you it’s too low.

Even then, there are factors that can get in the way, like sun block, clothing, clouds, pollution, having darker skin… which partly explains why vitamin D deficiency is a problem worldwide, not just in the colder, greyer zones.

How does vitamin D help protect against disease?

There are several mechanisms, and scientists are exploring new ones all the time. For a start, vitamin D blocks a number of inflammation pathways, so can be described as an anti-inflammatory. It also seems to prevent viruses, including Covid-19, from attaching to and entering your cells.

In addition, a form of vitamin D acts at genetic level, helping to stop disease genes from being expressed.

How much vitamin D should you be taking, and can you get it from food?

You can get vitamin D from oily fish, and a little from eggs and mushrooms. However, most health experts are currently suggesting that people supplement with vitamin D3 drops, sprays or tablets.

How much you need depends on your current levels. Your GP may offer you a blood test for this, or you can order bloodspot tests online quite cheaply. These are kits where you prick your finger and send a small sample of blood to be tested.

If the result comes back at around 50-60, this is deemed to be adequate, but not optimal. I would still suggest supplementing. If your test comes back at around 200 or more, then you’re taking too much, so stop!

To address very low levels, you may need to sake around 5000-10000iu vitamin D a day, but if your levels are pretty good, then 1000-2000iu daily should see you through winter. You may want to test periodically to make sure.

Like this article? You may like to read about how to boost your immune system

Do supplements always work?

I often recommend taking a supplement that also contains vitamin K2, as the two work together well. When you increase vitamin D, you also absorb more calcium, and vitamin K2 helps make sure that calcium goes towards strengthening your bones and teeth.

The human body is a complex thing, and sometimes adding in a missing nutrient is not the whole picture. In the case of vitamin D, for example, it will only carry out some of its functions if there are working vitamin D receptors (VDRs) in place. This is unfortunately not always the case, often for genetic reasons. So there is never a guarantee that correcting a deficiency with supplements will do the job.

There is still not enough research to know exactly what extra support needs to be in place. What has increasingly become apparent, though, is the importance of a varied and well-balanced wholefood diet, good hydration, regular exercise and regular practices that help reduce stress.

So don’t give up on good quality supplements – just make sure you’re giving your body the best chance to use them well. And with relation to Covid-19, keep an eye out for the results of a current trial to see if vitamin D supplementation actually works.

Silver Lifestyle – time to get your silver on with our retreats and products

Kirsten Chick

Kirsten Chick is a nutritional therapist and lecturer, and author of Nutrition Brought to Life.

www.kirstenchick.com

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